Word: ayckbourn
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Theater has come a long way since the days of ancient Greece, and British playwright Alan Ayckbourn is proof. If Aristotle was willing to dismiss any play that didn't strictly observe the three unities of time, place and action, one can only imagine what he would have to say to Ayckbourn. The second scene of his play How the Other Half Loves, in which two different dinner parties that take place in two different homes on two different days are presented simultaneously, would probably be enough to make the founder of Western literary criticism roll over in his grave...
Needless to say, directory Jerry Ruiz '00 and producer Tanya Melillo '01 have their work cut out for them in How the Other Half Loves. Ayckbourn's farce about marital infidelity is notoriously hard to stage effectively, and the rather conventional space provided by the Agassiz (as opposed to the more flexible Loeb Ex) doesn't make the task any easier. The result, while uneven at times, is admirable. More than that: it is remarkable...
...Poor Ayckbourn. The British playwright has turned out a string of increasingly dark, provocative comedies. Yet the few U.S. productions of his work tend to reinforce his outdated reputation as the British Neil Simon. Yes, Communicating Doors, now on display in a sprightly off-Broadway staging, is a relatively playful piece. A hooker (Mary-Louise Parker) gets called in to service an old geezer, who promptly confesses that he had his first two wives killed. She flees into a closet, doors spin, and we are transported to the same room 20 years earlier--then 20 years before that. The time...
...What if? trick. It has inspired such evocative works as Alan Ayckbourn's play Intimate Exchanges (a woman has, or doesn't have, a cigarette, and her choice leads to 16 variations) and Krzysztof Kieslowski's film Blind Chance (a man runs for a train and heads into three different realities). In writer-director Peter Howitt's version, the Helen who makes the train home finds her beau Gerry (John Lynch) in bed with his old girlfriend (Jeanne Tripplehorn); the Helen who misses the train gets mugged. And in both cases she meets a seemingly nice fellow, James (John Hannah...
...Jeeves. Andrew Lloyd Webber and Alan Ayckbourn collaborated 20 years ago on this musical about P.G. Wodehouse's unflappable butler, which was a London flop. Now, with a new book and a freshened-up score, it's back at Connecticut's Goodspeed-at-Chester theater in a charming production directed by Ayckbourn. The teacup wit and inventive, less-is-much-more staging would never survive a trip to Broadway, but resident theaters across the country should have a ball with...